So I was at the Consumer Electronics Show for the last two days. I had lots of time wandering the floor and seeing what was new.
The speaker displays were incredible. This year, all the cheap overseas speaker manufacturers have figured out that they can make absolutely gorgeous floorstanding speakers for not too much money, using the magical secret of veneer. I saw walnut, curly maple, and figured bubinga. Plus some zebrawood but that was hideous. The veneer is applied over an acoustically dead MDF base, so you get a great speaker that looks fantastic.
Then they took a good thing a little too far. If veneer is cool, well, why not make the speakers out of solid wood? So sure enough, they’re using fancy 4/4 lumber to make speakers as well (not so cheap!). They look fantastic… but this is an accoustically stupid idea. Solid wood is actually worse for speakers than MDF, because the wood fibers resonate and mess up the acoustics. It’s also more expensive. So why replace cheap, good MDF with expensive, worse solid wood? Probably because consumers won’t know any better (possibly because the manufacturers don’t know any better!).
Anyway, it was pretty stuff. Look for a big improvement in the looks of floorstanding speakers at the Best Buys of the world next year.
Oh, and the lesson for us woodworkers? Veneer over MDF. Cheaper, more beautiful, and sounds better.

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